The international success of her works led Barbella to undertake numerous trips, both to bring the sculptures in person to exhibitions, and to work on commissions for portraits to be performed from life. In 1904 he went to London - where he found his friend Francesco Paolo Tosti - to take part with a large solo exhibition at the "Italian Exhibition" at the Earls Court Exhibition Center: there, he sold numerous sculptures and obtained commissions for portraits of characters from the high society, he was asked to create a sculptural group depicting the wounding of Admiral Nelson (lot 109). The artist made it on his return to his homeland, and then ordered a casting at the Nelli foundries in Rome, presented in 1905 to the Royal United Service Institution at the palace of Whitehall (now in Greenwich at the National Maritime Museum) on the occasion of the celebrations for the centenary of the battle of Trafalgar. The present terracotta version of the group is particularly suitable for documenting the mature phase of Costantino Barbella's artistic activity, in the first decade of the twentieth century still at the height of fame. Subsequently, with the tumultuous arrival of modernity and the avant-gardes, his figure became more and more secluded on the national scene, while continuing to count on important commissions and the unanimous recognition of a career now consigned to the history of art.

Manuel Carrera

July 2020